


pray the sun will rise

by simply_kelp



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Canonical Character Death, M/M, Sibling Incest, Valinor, codependent Feanorians
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-07
Updated: 2016-02-07
Packaged: 2018-05-18 22:30:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,528
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5945623
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/simply_kelp/pseuds/simply_kelp
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first time he sees Curvo it’s like rushing water, like when Irissë accidentally kicked him in the stomach, like falling.</p>
            </blockquote>





	pray the sun will rise

Tyelko is still young when Moryo is born. Tyelko doesn’t like his new brother. He is loud and smelly and gets all the attention. Mother strokes the baby’s hair and sings to him and Tyelko’s two older brothers take turns holding Moryo. But Tyelko doesn’t like babies.

He would much rather wrestle with Oromë’s hounds or play hunting games with his cousin, Irissë. They’re not real-hunting yet; they’re not old enough. Tyelko is still too small to draw a bow quite right. Moryo can’t wrestle and he can’t play hunting games. He just cries and slobbers. Kano reminds Tyelko that he used to cry and slobber, and Nelyo shows Tyelko a scar on his finger that he swears is from Tyelko’s teeth. But that doesn’t change Tyelko’s opinion: babies are boring.

Everything changes when Curvo is born. Curvo is… Tyelko doesn’t know what difference there is, but it’s there. He’s less loud than Moryo but he still slobbers. Yet Tyelko doesn’t mind when he finds Curvo gumming on the sheath to his favorite hunting knife. There is a stain on the leather but that’s okay because it hides a couple imperfections. (Tyelko made the sheath himself, spent hours tooling leaves and twining vines onto it.)

The first time he sees Curvo it’s like rushing water, like when Irissë accidentally kicked him in the stomach, like falling. Curvo rests in Mother’s arms. She is singing snatches of the lullabies she used to sing to Tyelko and to Moryo (and to Kano and Nelyo before them). His eyes are half-closed. Tyelko reaches out, caresses a tuft of dark hair. Curvo screams.

From that point Tyelko treats Curvo like a wild animal. He approaches softly, perches nearby. He is close enough for Curvo to recognize his presence but not so close to be a threat. His new brother only seems to like their father and mother. He will fuss in Nelyo or Kano’s arms and he screams if anyone else tries to hold him.

As days become weeks, Curvo’s eyes change from blue to grey. The dark hair on his head fills in. Of the five of them, he most resembles their father. Mother gives him the name Atarinkë. He is happiest under their father’s care. Reluctantly, Tyelko asks Kano to teach him lullabies. Kano smiles a secret sort of smile but he agrees without much fuss.

It is another day that Mother calls him over. She pats the spot of the sofa next to her. Tyelko feels Curvo’s eyes on him as he sits. She whispers soothing words to Curvo and places him tenderly, gently in Tyelko’s arms. Tyelko holds Curvo like a baby bird, like he might break. He sings one of the lullabies Kano taught him. Curvo’s grey eyes shine silver as he watches Tyelko but he doesn’t scream.

Their mother says that Curvo is too young to go hunting with Tyelko. He is able to walk, but only just. Tyelko tells her that he is taking Curvo with him to visit Irissë. It’s not a lie; they do visit Irissë but not at her father’s house. Curvo’s little feet cannot move fast enough. He grips at Tyelko’s tunic as they hike through the woods.

Irissë is far ahead of them. She grins back at Tyelko as if to say she will catch all the animals in the forest before he catches up to her. A small part of him thinks of racing up to her, of pushing her down and dirtying her white dress. They used to wrestle more when they were younger. Instead he takes Curvo into his arms and quickens his pace until he catches up with Irissë. “Took you long enough,” she says. Curvo plays with one of Tyelko’s braids.

They follow the trail of a deer. Irissë slips silently though the trees, her dress dappled by the shadow of leaves, dark braid swinging behind her. Tyelko nestles Curvo into his side, crouches low to trace the path of hoof prints.

It is late when they finally spot the deer. Irissë’s eyes flash in a wordless challenge. Tyelko draws an arrow from his quiver, nocks it to his bow, draws back, takes aim, his heart stops, and—

_Snap!_

The deer startles and dashes through the trees and out of sight. _Snap!_ Curvo breaks another twig in his tiny hands. Irissë winces like she’s expecting Tyelko to yell. Tyelko half-expects himself to be angry. He didn’t talk to Irissë for a week when she broke his rabbit trap once. But… it’s Curvo.

Tyelko sets down his bow and takes the broken twigs from Curvo’s hands. He teaches Curvo how to walk through brush without making a sounds, the names of plants and what they can be used for, the proper way to hold a spear (although Curvo’s too young to do so). They don’t catch anything but for once Tyelko doesn’t mind.

Curvo spends less time hunting with them as he ages. He prefers the heat of the forge and the feel of metal in his hands to the woods. Tyelko’s first kiss is with Irissë. Under rain-drenched leaves, her fingers cool on his cheek, his bow slips from his hand into the mud. Her lips are soft and he loves her. He would marry her one day, the laws would permit it. But she has told him that she will call no man husband.

The twins come much later. Curvo is nearly full grown when they are born. Ambarussa their mother names them. Like Nelyo, they share the copper hair of their mother’s kin. Out of the seven, Tyelko is the only one with golden hair. In appearance he could be mistaken for one of his Arafinwean cousins, but not in temperament.

The twins, as they age, take an interest in hunting. Moryo says they are too young but they are older than Curvo was the first time Tyelko took him. They pester Tyelko with questions—the ones Moryo won’t answer for them—until finally he relents, takes them (more or less in secret). Curvo joins them. Tyelko shows the twins how to walk through the forest without making any noise, how to wield a knife. They already have practice with bows.

But the twins, perhaps it’s because they are still young. Ambarussa keep talking, trampling through the underbrush, they shove each other and wrestle through scattered leaves. They make so much noise that Tyelko can feel the emptiness of the forest. Even the birds have flown off.

He sends Curvo ahead when they’re distracted. They don’t notice they’ve been abandoned at first, too busy play-fighting with their hunting knives. They are never in any real danger: Tyelko tails them, able to step in at a second’s notice. They spend much of the day wandering. It’s late, Telperion’s light waxing, when they find their way out.

Mother doesn’t listen to Tyelko explanations. Her eyes flash with fire. She forbids him from hunting the rest of the season and he does not dare to disobey her. So that is how he spends much of the season cooped up in the forge watching Curvo’s nimble hands make weapons and jewelry, each piece more beautiful than the last. Seeing Curvo in his element—tongue between his teeth, the sheen of sweat along his brow, shoulders slightly hunched, his fingers reverent as they ghost over twining strands of silver—almost makes Tyelko forget how much he misses the scent of trees.

Tyelko does not much care for things made by hand, but for Curvo he makes an exception. Curvo makes Tyelko perfectly weighted arrow points, spears and a short sword for hunting. Tyelko cannot use them yet, but he knows they are finer than what he already owns. Curvo also makes him a silver comb. On the handle is a scene of Oromë’s hounds pursuing deer that almost seem to leap through the silver.

Father taught Tyelko to work with metal years ago, but his abilities are lacking. He makes a crooked ring with half-formed leaves. Tyelko would throw it out or melt it down but Curvo takes it from him. He slips it on a chain and wears it under his tunic.

It is that evening at dinner that their father announces Curvo’s betrothal. His intended is a bright eyed elf-maid from a family almost as old as theirs. Curvo is silent and grim-faced. Tyelko cannot bring himself to eat, the food tastes like ash on his tongue.

Tyelko retreats. He follows Oromë deep in the woods. He wears clothes made of skins, lets his hair grow wild and learns the languages of beasts and birds, befriends Huan. He is a comfort, Tyelko’s arms wrapped around the vast and shaggy warmth of his fur when they rest. He misses Curvo terribly.

Tyelko does not count the passing years. He does not think of the crooked ring on a chain and whether it is still tucked beneath Curvo’s tunic or the silver comb that he left behind. Ambarussa join Oromë’s hunting party on occasion. They give him news of their parents, of Moryo and of Nelyo and Kano. They mention Curvo in passing. He is well, they say. Tyelko doesn’t respond.

It is years, decades, before Huan leads a dark and somber figure to Tyelko. Curvo doesn’t meet his eyes when he speaks. “I want my son to know his uncle.” He extends a hand. Cautiously Tyelko steps forward, terrified that his brother is some kind of illusion. The hand he takes in his is warm and solid. _I miss you_. They don’t say it, but they don’t need to.

Tyelko laughs far too loud and teases that he will cut it all off. Curvo, of course, will not allow this. He takes Tyelko, undresses him, practically forces him into the tub where he spends hours meticulously untangling each strand of golden hair. (Curvo has always been fond of Tyelko’s hair, as a toddler he would pull the curls straight and laugh as they flew back into place.) Huan lies near them, amusement flashing in his eyes as Tyelko, who has never been one for staying still, sits penitent and unmoving.

Curvo’s fingertips brush against Tyelko’s bare shoulders as he collects the matted tangles of hair, Tyelko leans into the touch. The process is long and painful; Curvo separates out small sections, works through them first with his fingers then a comb. Tyelko resists the impulse to complain, to tease Curvo. There is too much tension, too many things unsaid; he can’t bring himself to bridge the gap. Curvo anoints his hair with oils, massages Tyelko’s scalp with hands that are gentle, hesitant, almost as if he can’t believe that Tyelko is truly here.

They stay that way long after the water has cooled. Curvo drawing his fingers through damp curls with little resistance, his hands occasionally making contact with skin, fingertips stroking along Tyelko’s ear as he tucks his hair back. Tyelko shivers, wants so badly to lean into the touch, to turn his head and press his lips to Curvo’s palm. But he doesn’t and the spell is broken. Curvo wraps Tyelko’s hair in a towel. “You must be cold,” he says.

Tyelpe is small and dark with large grey eyes that shine like Telperion’s blossoms. He screams with joy when Huan presses his wet nose to Tyelpe’s pudgy, little hand. Huan is enduringly patient, does not react when Tyelpe grasps fistfuls of fur and tugs. Tyelko’s dislike of babies endures, but he will make an exception for Curvo’s son.

Tyelpe’s mother is quiet, dark-haired, calm like a still, clear pool of water. She is as unlike Tyelko as an elf could be, grows faint at the thought of hunting. A part of him hates her (wonders if Curvo ever felt the sting of jealousy when he looked at Irissë). She smiles at Tyelko, sad and knowing, the expression never quite meeting her eyes and he wonders if a part of her might hate him as well.

The sky is red flame, bright and angry like an open wound. It is painful to look at and Tyelko knows that there is something catastrophically wrong. He hears the frantic whispers— _was it the Enemy? Manwë’s brother; we should have never trusted the Valar_ —feels the terror well deep within him. He has never known fear like this. Their father is gone, away in Tirion, and Tyelko is so afraid.

The sky fades. To a dark, viscous, bloody sort of red. It seeps into everything it touches. The faces of his brothers, his grandfather, their people look like corpses, like bone. Like death. For the first time, Tyelko feels the primal fear of death. He reaches out a skeletal hand and just before everything turns to pitch black he grasps Curvo’s hand in his. He cannot find Huan.

Deprived of his sight, the noise overshadows his other senses, overwhelms him. Screams and cries of many voices, the crashes and clatter of all of them, blind and panicked and terror-struck, running for their lives. He keeps Curvo’s hand in his, holds onto it because it is the only solid connection he has in this new and horrible blackness.

They crash into Nelyo, Nelyo who tells Tyelko to take his brother and flee to safety—if such a place exists. Their grandfather’s voice cuts through the Darkness: “Stand!” he roars. “Take courage and fight! Let us die defending our home and not as vermin fleeing into the Dark.”

Tyelko wants to heed his grandfather’s words. He can feel the hesitation in his brother’s movements, knows that they are of the same mind. But he can’t. The only thought that he has, that he will allow himself to have, is that he must protect Curvo. Let Darkness endure, let their grandfather and their people face terror and slaughter, let Tyelko perish, but Eru please keep Curvo safe.

They hide. In the Darkness they hide. The Darkness, it is not an absence of light, but rather an entity of its own—a black, cloying, heavy feeling. Tyelko wraps his arms around Curvo, clutches him to his chest, his mouth is so close to his brother’s face that his lips brush Curvo’s cheek as he tries to fill the oppressive silence with whatever words will come, hopes that hearing his voice might help calm the rabbit-fast heartbeat he feels through Curvo’s chest.

He speaks of the first time he saw Curvo, how it was as if he had suddenly found a piece of his soul that he hadn’t known was missing. Of taking Curvo hunting as a child, of the softness of his hair and all the lonesome nights he spent in Oromë’s hunting party. How jealous Tyelko had been of their father, wishing that Curvo would look at him with the same sort of admiration; of Tyelpe’s mother, how it kills him that he must share Curvo with another. _I have always loved you_ , he whispers, Curvo’s hands tighten their grip on Tyelko’s tunic, his head rests in the crook of Tyelko’s neck, his lips pressed to Tyelko’s collarbone. _I love you so much it sometimes hurts._

Hours pass and the Darkness begins to fade. A pale, sickly sort of light replaces it. Huan finds them first, presses against Tyelko’s side, warm and solid. A hollow laugh tumbles past Tyelko’s lips, his hands shaking as he reaches out to caress Huan. Curvo presses his forehead to Tyelko’s, breathes for what feels like the first time.

It is later when they return to the stronghold that they hear of their grandfather’s death. Lamplight illuminates the chamber and the grim faces of their people. The twins, eyes red-rimmed, cling to Moryo, Nelyo and Kano are never more than an arm’s reach away from each other. Curvo slips his hand from Tyelko’s, crosses the room to take Tyelpe into his arms. Tears well in his eyes as he holds his son. Tyelko sinks to his knees, presses his forehead to Huan’s side, buries his fingers into Huan’s shaggy coat.

The words of the Oath twine around Tyelko like a physical entity. He feels their claws and teeth dig into his skin. His eyes open and it’s like he had been living in a world of shadows. Everything is electrified, laced with the gold and silver of the gems. He can feel the blood coursing through his veins, his mind races. His palms itch for the feel of the silmarils. Tyelko looks over to Curvo, Curvo whose fingers retract, clasped around a phantom gem.

As the months pass, it becomes a dull ache. An ever-present feeling in the back of their minds. He finds no rest, no joy in hunting or the feel of earth under his fingers. The preparations are slow, their father paces, stalks like a caged animal, nails biting into the palms of his hands.

“Please,” Mother says, eyes wet. Tyelko cannot meet her eyes, knows that he is going to his doom. But he would follow Curvo to the Halls of Mandos, to the gates of the Enemy and deep into his stronghold. Mother tucks a lock of hair behind Tyelko’s ear, smooths the creases in his tunic. Look after your brother, she says. She asks him to speak with Ambarussa; they do not know the peril that they face. “I cannot bear to lose all of my sons.”

The twins cannot be convinced. They are young. They can only think of adventure, of new lands and glory gained in battle. He sees also the hunger behind their eyes, the hunger that their father planted in all of them. Hunger for gold and silver gems.

It is the first real battle they’ve experienced. They lose allies, though less than the Teleri. His fair-haired cousins have lost relatives. Tyelko lost sight of Curvo in the fray. He searches through the scattered bodies, turns over countless dark-haired corpses, his heart in his throat. Huan trails after him, white fur blood-soaked, nose searching the air. When they find Curvo his face is blank, his knuckles white over the hilt of his sword. Tyelko holds him close, presses their foreheads together. Kissing Curvo is all tongue and teeth, blood-slick hands sneaking under tunics and leaving sticky red streaks on sweat-damp skin. Kissing Curvo is like a promise.

They barely speak on the passage to Arda. Tyelko can still feel Curvo’s warm skin against his fingertips, his teeth on Tyelko’s lips. The Valar would call it a consequence of the Doom, of the Oath, but for Tyelko it feels like a culmination. It feels like an inevitability. He hums the tune of a half-remembered lullaby to Tyelpe as Curvo’s nimble hands weave braids into his hair. A part of Tyelko—small and foolishly hopeful—thinks that they may be fine.

Fresh screams pierce through the crackling of the burning ships. Ambarussa throws himself into the sea, his own cries a perfect mirror of those from the ship. Moryo dives in after him, drags him from the water. Ambarussa kicks and screams, claws at the arms around his waist. He screams until his voice is gone. Moryo holds him close, caresses his hair until Ambarussa exhausts himself.

The host looks on dumbstruck. The cries from the ship have been silenced. The only sound is the roar of flames. Father is white. Nelyo places a hand on Kano’s shoulder, Kano’s lips move in soundless music. Tyelko twines his fingers with Curvo’s. He remembers the name their mother gave Telufinwë: Umbarto—the fated. They are six now.

Ambarussa is nearly catatonic; Moryo hasn’t left his side for days. They are all afraid of what he might do. They take turns watching Moryo watching Ambarussa. And if Nelyo and Kano sit thighs and shoulders touching, Tyelko doesn’t mention it. As they mercifully don’t mention how his fingers have become permanently entangled with Curvo’s.

(Tyelko wonders if he will see Irissë again. Whether she will perish crossing the Helcaraxë or whether she will return to Valinor in disgrace.)

Father visits Ambarussa when he can spare the time. His days and nights are spent directing troops, sending scouting parties, allocating supplies, planning the eventual assault on Angband. They do not discuss his coming, the brothers. All but Moryo quietly slip out of the tent when they hear his footsteps approach. Tyelko does not mean to listen, but one night he hears their father’s whispered apologies to Mother and to Ambarussa (to the dead son he left at Losgar, to the one barely clinging to life, to both of them as one). But their father can’t swear vengeance against his own hand.

Tyelko takes Curvo’s hand and leads him out of camp. Starlight trickles through the high branches of the oak trees. Curvo’s eyes look black. They kiss, less desperate than the one they shared at Alqualondë. Searching. Hands roam through layers of fabric, untie laces. Curvo’s steady hands on his hips help ground Tyelko. He backs Curvo into the trunk of an ancient oak. In the morning Curvo will return to his young son, they will both return to their people and their responsibilities. But for tonight they take what comfort they can.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "Coming Down" by Halsey.


End file.
